


what he'll lose

by Jae



Category: NSYNC
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-09-20
Updated: 2006-09-20
Packaged: 2017-10-06 12:47:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/53817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jae/pseuds/Jae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chris knows it's a trap when he sets it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	what he'll lose

Chris knows it's a trap when he sets it.

There are eighteen people in the world who truly know Chris, although Chris believes the number to be fourteen. Perhaps you will understand something about Chris if you know that he has made a list of these people, many times in his head and once written on a sheet of paper that he threw out the next morning in embarrassment, and then rescued from the trash and burnt. Twelve of these people have said to Chris at one time or another that he's too clever by half, too smart for his own good, sharp enough to cut himself, or words to that effect. He thinks they mean his sharp tongue, his smart mouth, his talent for cutting insults, but what they really mean are the traps he sets knowingly.

He chooses the time to call with great care. Even the fact that he makes the call is part of the trap, because Chris is the one who has been wronged. Everyone agrees, all eighteen of the people who know Chris and the many others who think they do. If you were to explain the situation to a stranger on the street (using different names, of course, because otherwise the natural reaction would be to laugh at the absurdity or to sell the story to Us Weekly), he or she would agree that Chris is in the right. Even Justin has admitted it, slumped against the bed in Chris' room, his voice hoarse, worn down against the relentless force of Chris' argument. "You're right, you're always fucking right," Justin said, and he believed it. He believes it now. "You're right, and I don't fucking care," he'd said. Chris doesn't believe this now.

In every relationship, they say, there is a lover and a beloved, and in every relationship, there is someone who is almost always right, the voice of reason. If each time you tell a friend that you've had a fight with your lover, they say, "What did you do?" you are not this person. Before Justin, Chris had never been this person. He likes being this person. He loves it. Sometimes he thinks it is the thing he loves most about Justin, that only with Justin is Chris the person who is always wronged, always right.

Chris knows this to be a lie when he tells it to himself. This is a trap, too, a different one, because to lie to himself about what he loves most about Justin is to think about the truth. These are the things Chris loves most about Justin (although he would use the past tense, another lie he recognizes when he tells it):

Justin knows how to wait. When Chris hears Justin's name, or thinks it, the image he sees, always, sometimes just for a moment before he finds the memory he was reaching for, sometimes for as long as Chris can bear to dwell on it, is Justin leaning against a wall, seeing what he wants and smiling as he waits for it to come to him. Justin knows it will. Chris has never learned this, how to wait, how to want and not reach out for what he wants, how to lean on the knowledge that what he wants will find him. There's a distance Justin knows how to live in between desire and possession. Chris has never been comfortable in that distance. Chris grabs.

Not that Justin minds. That's something else Chris loves about Justin. There are prettier ways to say it, subtler ways, but there is one way Chris has always loved to say it. Justin likes it rough. Chris used to whisper that to Justin because he knew it pissed him off, knew it pissed Justin off and knew if he timed it just right it wouldn't matter how much it pissed Justin off, Justin would come just from Chris' words in his ear and Chris' dick in his ass. It was true but Justin was desperate to hide it, desperate to hide it until Chris cracked him wide open with his mouth and his hands and then Justin was just plain desperate.

"You're right," Justin would say then, first breathless and low and then raw and loud because Chris could make him, Justin knew, for this one thing Chris was willing to wait. "You're right, it's true," and sometimes, after, Chris would joke that there were two words that would always make him come and they were _you're right_. A joke, of course, to make Justin laugh. Chris is the first to admit that he loves to make Justin laugh, no joke too easy or too small. He's shameless about it.

Here is one thing Chris is not shameless about: What he loves are not the words _you're right_, but the words _it's true_ and the sweet defiant tilt of Justin's chin as he says them, not just in bed but whenever Chris says something Justin knows is true, something that is true and that Justin doesn't want to know.

Justin's not a liar, exactly; Chris has said those words to many people and to himself more times than he can count. Justin's not a liar, exactly, but he chooses his words with a care that Chris can't completely ascribe to four thousand days and counting of dealing with press. Justin's not a liar, exactly, but when he doesn't want to tell the truth there's always an ironic inflection, a smile perfectly timed to cast doubt on what he's just said.

_Man, I wish I could dance around the question like that._ Chris has said those words to many people more times than he can count, jokingly, but he has never truly wished that. When he has to lie – when he wants to, he always says, no one has to lie, you always choose – when he wants to lie he does it blatantly, outrageously, flatly. He doesn't hide behind those cowardly games. It is something he secretly despises in Justin. Of course, it is no secret to Justin; Chris has told him in a hundred small ways and once straight out. "That's chickenshit," he said, and he thought Justin would snap back at him but instead Justin caught his breath and said, "It's true," and lifted his chin for whatever else Chris would throw at him.

What Chris loves about Justin is that he doesn't hide from the truth when Chris tells it to him.

Another thing that Chris is not shameless about: a picture he keeps in an envelope buried in the bottom of his sock drawer. It's not a dirty picture, or no dirtier than any other picture of Justin at eighteen spread out across a hotel bedspread with his shirt off. It only feels dirty, Chris tells himself, because he remembers that day. The hotel was in New Mexico, which would make anyone think of heat shimmering off the pavement and sunlight slanting through the window over Justin's skin, but Chris remembers that day how it poured. As they drove in Chris said he thought it didn't rain in New Mexico and JC said they averaged eight and a half inches a year. Chris would swear they had gotten the whole year's allotment and more that day, the rain banishing them to their rooms until it was time for the show.

The picture feels dirty, Chris tells himself, because he remembers what it felt like to take it. They'd been so warned against any kind of incriminating photo or video that just holding the camera in his hands felt daring, dangerous. Just looking at Justin through it felt obscene.

The picture does not feel dirty because of the way Chris looked at Justin. In the picture Justin strikes a pose like a supermodel, looking not at the camera but at Chris behind it. He's smiling just a little, not like he's teasing but like he can't help himself. He's looking at Chris like he believes that Chris has invented the soft bedspread beneath him and the rhythm of the rain outside, the whole world around them just to delight Justin and to surprise him. Justin's looking at Chris like Chris just invented him, and he's surprised by himself and delighted.

What Chris loves most and is not shameless about at all: That look, and Justin.

If you ever want to see Chris at his angriest, you need only say one thing. If he doesn't know you well, he'll simply walk away coldly and you will not see him again. If he does know you well, or more importantly, if he thinks you know him, before he walks away he'll say, "I never fucking touched him until he was more than old enough and more than ready." Even Justin will tell you, with indignation that still lingers, of the escalating series of stratagems that proved useless in getting Chris into bed on Justin's timetable. "He was a fucking saint to resist me that long," Justin has laughed, many times, and each time Chris shakes his head as if at Justin's arrogance and changes the subject quickly.

Oh, there's no secret they are hiding from Justin's mother, no terrible moment that Justin has repressed. Every word Chris would say is absolutely true; he could have made his move a year earlier and still been blameless. That's not what makes Chris flinch, the way you do when your tongue skims against a sore tooth, every time Justin tells that story. That's not what sends a hot sweet stab of pain flooding through Chris every once in a while, when Justin laughs before Chris finishes the joke, when Justin lifts his chin and steps into the harshest truth Chris can hurl at him, when Justin clasps his hands behind his back before bending down to take Chris' cock in his mouth.

Only when Chris is very very drunk does he let himself think about it, and even then it is only because the alcohol has drowned the control that usually keeps his mind from rushing straight toward what he does not want to think about. When he is that drunk he doesn't have words for what he doesn't want to think about; he merely remembers walking into a room in time to hear Joey say, "It's kind of great that Chris has found the one person in the world who can actually put up with all his bullshit. Not just put up with it, but, like, _like_ it." Chris remembers that he almost smiled until he saw JC raise an eyebrow and say, crisply,

"Found?"

Now, Chris would swear to you that he was no Svengali with his Trilby (although that is not the phrase he'd use; perhaps he'd swear that he was no bearded rebel Mormon raising himself a child bride), although this is beside the point. The truth Chris fears is not that he molded Justin against his will into exactly what he wanted.

The truth Chris fears without naming it is that he molded Justin into someone Chris would love and lose. Someone who would love Chris and leave him.

Exactly what he wanted.

Perhaps you remember those traps Chris sets: this would be one. Of course, it has not put Chris off traps for life, or for a minute.

The trap Chris plans to set now is very simple. He will call Justin. He will call Justin three days before Justin's album drops, when he's right in the middle of promo, and then he will measure Justin's friendship (this is what Chris calls it) by how long it takes Justin to call him back. Oh, it's unfair, of course, Chris admits that cheerfully. He remembers how insane that time could be, anticipation and anxiety rubbing each other raw inside him and question after idiotic question from reporters and DJs landing exactly on the sore spot. In the days before their albums dropped, he and Justin wouldn't even talk when they got back to their room, would fuck silently because by the end of the day the only thing each of them hated more than the sound of each other's voices was the sound of their own.

A less honest man than Chris would tell you that he decided to give Justin some warning, a fair shot. In the same situation (although Chris can barely even think that without laughing, Justin in the same situation), Justin would say, "It's not really fair, to call out of the blue at his busiest time, but I knew he was hanging out with JC so I called and gave JC a heads-up." Chris knows that he is not calling JC out of a sense of fairness, or to give Justin a heads-up. He wants JC to tell Justin that Chris will be calling. He wants to know for sure that his message wasn't lost, his voicemail accidentally deleted. Chris wants no excuses, no false hope, as the days spin out and Justin doesn't call back.

When Chris tells him JC says, flatly, "Returning to the scene of the crime?" Joey or Lance might have said exactly the same thing, and Chris would have said, "Come on, he didn't do anything wrong – I mean, not that wrong, it's not a crime not to…" With JC Chris doesn't bother; he knows JC sees through him.

Chris says, "I don't think anybody will be returning."

"You never do," JC says, and Chris has nothing to say to that.

"I'll tell him," JC says, "if you tell me one thing." Chris inhales noisily, the opposite of a sigh. It's the closest thing to a shrug he can manage on the telephone.

"What will you say to him if he answers the phone?" Before Chris can say anything, JC hangs up.

Leave it to JC to ask a question that's so right and so wrong at the same time. The question isn't so much what Chris will say if Justin answers the phone, but how he will say it.

Of course, Chris thinks he is ninety-nine percent sure Justin won't pick up the phone. At the best of times it can take Justin a week or two to call back, so it would be easy for Chris not to bother to think about JC's question. But what is easy has never been something Chris trusts, perhaps because nothing he has ever truly had has been easy. There are things Chris can make look easy, but nothing has ever been effortless. He has never had Justin's easy charm, his easy smile, his easy acceptance of the good things his life has given him. Oh, it's not that Chris thinks Justin doesn't work hard, that he's not grateful. No one in the world has ever been as grateful as Justin, Chris often thinks, and certainly no one has ever talked as much about how grateful he is. It's another thing that comes easily to Justin, gratitude, and although Chris tells himself it's another thing that he loves about Justin, it is another thing Chris distrusts. Chris struggles to erase the running lists in his head of the kind things he has done, the hard things, the deserving things, and of the people who have as much as he does or more and who have done less to earn it. Chris is always careful to be grateful. He has to be.

Of course, Chris is ninety percent sure Justin won't pick up the phone, but Chris knows what he will say if Justin does. _Hey, J_, he'll say, like he has so many times in the past few years, and it will be only natural to say it with a laugh, to rush over Justin's greeting with a joke. He has several prepared. They are all variations on the theme of bringing sexy back and none of them are very funny, although Justin will find them so. Chris will throw question after question at Justin, all of them light enough not to leave a mark, and he will barely let Justin answer. By the time Justin has to run, and he will, of course, because it's crazy there, Chris can't even – well, _Chris_ can, but it's been good talking, by that time they will have had the same conversation they've been having for the past few years – friendly, cheerful, easy.

Half of the time Chris thinks he wants desperately to fall into that trap.

It isn't true even half of the time. That trap is not what Chris wants, but it is what he isn't afraid to have. What Chris wants and is afraid of is another conversation that starts, _Hey, J_, starts there and then pauses. Perhaps this time it will be Justin who rushes into the pause, filling it with a joke, possibly a variation on the theme of bringing sexy back, very similar to the ones Chris would tell. Perhaps, but even Chris can't convince himself that that's what he's afraid of.

Chris is not a fool, testimony of several teachers and hotel managers and ex-girlfriends to the contrary, and he knows that there is a reason he is even thinking about making this call. The last time he saw Justin, at a party, Chris said, "Hey, J," without thinking about it, said, "Hey, J," and then stopped, because he thought the conversation was over, because he thought Justin would want to get back to the party. He did, of course, but before the party surged back around him Justin looked at Chris, like he was hearing something, like he was remembering. Without thinking Chris reached out to grab him, but before he could the party closed around Justin and pulled him away. It wasn't until Chris was standing alone against the wall again that he remembered.

Chris couldn't remember where it had been; there were so many hotel rooms, so many beds where Justin looked up at him wide-eyed in the dark. It was the kind of thing Chris thought that Justin was always saying, although if pressed Chris could only remember him saying this the once. "You say my name that way," Justin had said, and could it only have been the once? Chris remembers it so clearly. "You say my name and I feel like I'll always be hearing you say it, I feel like I'll be hearing you say it that way forever." Chris had turned his head away, like he didn't want to laugh, he was humoring Justin, but really it was because there was nothing special about the way he'd said Justin's name. It was the way he always said it, the way he knew he'd be saying it forever.

Chris is not afraid that if he says Justin's name, says it and lets the silence rise around it, he is not afraid that Justin won't remember.

There is something that Chris is afraid of, and to give him his due he knows it. Although some may doubt it, he does struggle to be honest with himself, and he succeeds as much as most of us, more than many. Chris tries to not to hide from the truth when he tells it to himself.

This is what Chris is afraid of:

Long ago, but not as long ago as Chris likes to believe, a hotel room and someone slumped against the bed and Chris was right, finally, finally. "You're right," Dani said and she wasn't yelling anymore. She said it as matter-of-factly as if Chris had suggested the correct answer to her crossword puzzle. "You're right," Dani said. "Are you happy now?"

Chris snapped at her because of course, of course he wasn't happy. What he was was satisfied. He'd known, he'd always known there was a limit to her love. He'd always known and now he'd found it and he wasn't happy but he was right.

Long ago, longer ago than Chris likes to believe, another hotel room, someone else slumped against the bed and Chris was right, again, Chris was right. "You're right, and I don't fucking care," Justin said, and Chris wasn't happy. He'd known, he'd always known there was a limit to love. He'd always known and now he'd found it and he wasn't happy but he was right.

"I never should have …" Chris says. "I lost fucking everything and you don't fucking –"

Justin's hand fell against the floor, a dull thud like he'd dropped a book he'd never wanted to read in the first place. "No, you didn't," he said, matter-of-factly, like Chris had claimed to run an errand he'd actually forgotten. "You didn't," he said, and Chris wasn't happy and Justin was right.

Even then Chris had known it, although only now can he say it without hiding it from himself. Chris is not afraid of losing Justin; he has lost Justin, and Dani, and more. He is not afraid of losing Justin again, but he is afraid of what he might lose.

There has always been a limit to Chris' love. He has never been able to make the leap Justin made so easily into that darkness (and to give Chris his due, it can be so dark). Justin fell and Chris followed him, but always there has been one thin line holding him back. Not enough to keep him unbruised, not enough to keep him whole, but he has never lost his heart. He has never lost himself. He doesn't know if he can bear to.

This is the trap, Chris knows. He knows because he set it. He can't see his way into it. He can't see his way out of it. This is the trap; Chris can see it finally. There is only one thing he can think of to do.

Chris dials Justin's number and listens to it ring, once, twice, three times.

Justin answers the phone.


End file.
